Snow Time Like The Present
by Greysouthpaw
Summary: Every cloud has a silver lining, right? So getting stranded by a blizzard at the worlds sleaziest motel after a prisoner transfer can't be all that bad for the two detectives. Provided they don't get murdered. Welcome to Jake and Amy's awkward friendship/maybe-something-more where they fight hypothermia, an undeniable attraction and possibly the creepy motel manager. Pre-season 3.


**Post season 2 episode 9 and 14, Got snowed in the other day and that was how this crazy fluffy story was dreamed up.**

* * *

"Pull over, Peralta! You can't see where we are going!" Amy whined again with her arms crossed impatiently in the passenger seat.

Her immature partner, squinted through the icy windscreen of the work vehicle, struggling to discern anything in the featureless white back drop of the snow storm and the fading light.

"That's not true, Santiago." He replied contritely, trying the windscreen wipers again in futility. They rubber flanges shrieked in protest and did nothing to move the stubborn ice that had formed.

"I can see a little sliver of black here in the corner which I think is the road.." Jake tried to reassure her.

Santiago looked both unconvinced and unimpressed.

Amy was finishing (she was now well past the point of starting) to regret accepting the up state prisoner return they had embarked on together.

The last one she had done with Jake had ended so awkwardly at the Maple Drip Inn and her dumping Teddy. Some certain feelings were mentioned and he may have teased her about them.

Typical Jake and Amy stuff. And that was the problem that there were Jake and Amy moments, which finished with uncertainty and neither really knowing what to do with them.

 _Would it have been different at the time if Jake had been single then, like he was now? Who knows,_ Amy sometimes wondered.

It was over a month ago and she really should have known better to accept another similar assignment with her unconventional colleague/sometimes friend and guy that always bordered on almost something else more intimate.

This assignment had been a return job; dropping off some crim who had skipped out of state and picked Brooklyn of all places to try and hide, in the winter no less! _Most criminals are not smart_ , Amy reflected for not the first or last time in her career.

At least on the drive North they had the convict there to mix up the dynamic and Jake patronizingly played as the long suffering parent on a long car trip. He had engaged 'the family' in games of eye-spy, provided snacks and juice boxes, played terrible music, reminded his 'son' not to sass his 'mother' and threatened multiple times to turn the car around.

In his usual undisciplined manner, Jake had also insisted on stopping at every tourist attraction along the way, meaning that they were two hours late for the rendezvous with the grumpy receiving officers. In response to her frustration, he innocently reminded her that memories would last forever and they had also each gotten some great souvenirs for the trouble. Amy had found a pretty snow globe which showed a scene of snowfall inside a library, which as Jake had pointed out probably wasn't great for the books. He had of course gotten a goofy pale blue beanie with a gaudy snowman bobble on top that he had refused to take off since.

 _Jake Peralta: the consummate professional._

Peralta had even bought a colourful reindeer scarf for their passenger, who adamantly refused to wear it and insisted that it breached some sort of rights, which he must have while in custody. Jake was disappointed, but happily donned the childish scarf too.

While her immature partner farewelled their prisoner, telling him to have fun at 'summer camp', Amy was acutely aware that once they got rid of their unruly 'child' that it would only be the two of them in the car. Alone, together for another six hours of driving.

* * *

To her surprise it had not been so awkward at all, singing along to Taylor Swift songs at the top of their voices and her pretending not to be amused by his various impersonations and theatrics. Even when driving they were a good team, Amy hated driving in snowy conditions as they had quickly become and Jake with his inexhaustible energy happily bounced away behind the wheel, bopping to music and leaning his head over her side so she could feed him snack food.

 _It had been fun,_ Amy begrudgingly admitted to herself in hindsight, a little flirty in places and it was in this time that realised that Jake was actually one of her favourite people. Although her ego would never allow her to inform him of that fact. His fun was the exact opposite of her uptight usual nature when working. Only he could make a boring interstate drive into a road trip filled with laughs, shenanigans and good times. Like all good times however they were destined not to last.

The weather had closed in big time; they found themselves suddenly the only car left on the road braving the blizzard that had engulfed the country side.

That brought them back to the present; Amy trying to get Jake to pull over and him stubbornly pushing on.

"Jacob Ethan Peralta! It is not safe, pull over!" Santiago finally ordered angrily, calling him by his rarely used full name.

Jake gulped, knowing that shit had just got serious with a capital 'S' which coincidently, was also the first letter in Santiago.

Her eyes narrowed at his and she wore a severe pout on her face, which made her look like a petulant child. Jake thought it was kinda cute, so he reluctantly complied with a dramatic sigh, pushed his bobbled snowman beanie out of his eyes and pulled the car over to a stop.

"Fine, but I'm only doing it because I want to and can't see a thing out there and not because you told me to." He clarified childishly.

"Thank you." Amy huffed in relief, the emotion visibly clouding her face. She rubbed her hands together trying to ward off the cold that had invaded the car, since the stupid borrowed vehicle somehow was the only one in the fleet with a broken heater.

"Now we wait here until the snow melts in spring?" Jake remarked, taking a large gulp from a frosty plastic bottle of a blueish antifreeze looking liquid.

Amy had a sudden flash of the two of them stuck in the car trying to keep warm and freezing to death. Certain ideas to retain body heat suggested themselves in the scenario in her head and she hastily looked away, lest her expression give her astute partner some clue as to what was running through her head.

"Where the heck are we anyway?" Peralta continued when she didn't immediately answer.

Amy pulled out her phone and waved it around in chilled, clumsy fingers trying for some signal bars. They had been following some backroad diversion because the main access route was already closed due to heavy snowfall.

"Have you got any reception?" She asked of him, returning her phone and hands back to her warm pockets.

Jake whipped out his phone and unlocked it by drawing a lazy hook of a 'j', it troubled Amy that she spent that much time with him that she knew how to open his phone. She also knew his background photo would be his Miley Cyrus victory selfie.

His jovial face creased in frustration and he 'hmmed' loudly.

"Have you got a location for us?" Amy pressed, becoming increasingly anxious about the whole situation. Jake of course tried his best to exacerbate things.

"No.." He murmured, turning to her with a dramatic expression. "It just says we are at the start of a horror film."

* * *

Amy punched him in the shoulder hard and he winced in pain.

"Stop it, butthead." She growled, Amy hated horror movies and their current situation did seem like the perfect set up for one. With five brothers who loved horror movies, she could hardly admit to being creeped out by the movies and this bravado of course carried through in the 99, especially when a certain man-child would use it as a source of unceasing amusement.

"We should probably find somewhere to hole up for the night." Jake suggested, not dropping his smirk and peering out his frozen windows at the small rest stop they had pulled up into.

Even in the poor visibility Amy could just make out the faint glowing sign for a motel just across the road.

"There." She pointed it out to her partner.

"How convenient, or perhaps it is a haunted motel that only appears for those in need so they can be murdered by the terrifying owner." Jake postulated in a spooky voice.

Amy rolled her eyes and steeled herself momentarily before forcing her car door open. The cold air hit her like a 150kg perp, body slamming her flat against the frigid car. Blinking against the blinding sleet that stung her face, Amy reached back into the car and retrieved her travel bag. On the other side of the car her tall, lean partner was doing the same.

He came around her side of the car, leaning against the wind and pulling his goofy hat lower over his wild curly hair. Together they stared at the dilapidated motel that stood in front of them and read the barely visible sign in incredulous silence for a change.

The illuminated neon sign had read 'The Sleep Easy Motel' but with the easy spelt with a 'z' instead of an 's'. Well that would ordinarily be the case except through neglect some of the letters of light had shorted out; the last three letters in sleep in fact.

It now read.

 **The Sl Eazy Motel**

The new motel name seemed to sum up the only apparent accommodation available to the unlucky detectives.

"No.." Amy mumbled in disbelief at the coincidence.

Jake had a different reaction, his eyes were alight with amusement and he snapped a photo of it with his phone.

"That is awesome." He breathed out in a cloud of fog and started towards the ominous motel office.

* * *

"Jake, wait!" Santiago called after him and caught his arm. He knew she was serious because she had called him Jake.

He turned back to her with a big goofy grin.

"We can't stay here." She begged him desperately, the eerie factor raising another notch at the terrible motel.

"Not much choice, Amy. Unless you want to spoon for warmth in the car all night?" He proposed with a waggle of those over expressive eyebrows of his.

Amy blushed at his suggestion and her discomfort at the thought of sharing a cold backseat pressed up against her TOTALLY platonic partner. It was not an unpleasant thought if she was honest, but it was the possible repercussions or slip up that might occur in such a night that held her tongue, perhaps quite literally.

Had he somehow read her expression earlier when the thought crossed her mind?

Spurred by her pride now, Santiago started to stride towards the motel, ignoring her immature partner who continued to make his eyebrows dance and no, she was absolutely not suppressing a grin.

Her boots crunched and sunk in the snow, the sleet and wind pushing her back so that her every step was an effort. Amy drew her jacket tighter across her chilled body and dragged her cute red woollen hat lower on her head. She blew an errant strand of hair out of her mouth as she struggled on, her bandy legged partner had easily caught up to her and seemed to have no trouble, which further fuelled her aggravation.

It constantly annoyed her how easily he managed things better than her, she would never admit it, but it was part of what fuelled her rivalry with him. He seemed to take nothing seriously, but was still an incredible, intuitive detective although she would rather eat her maroon merino wool beanie before she ever told him that. His giant ego was large enough she was surprised he could wear a hat at all.

Jake pushed open the stiff office door of the motel and graciously held it open for his colleague to enter first. The gesture may not have been as chivalrous as once thought though, more based upon his own apprehension it would seem. This was reinforced by his belated following of her in and when he subsequently jumped with her, when they were surprised by the appearance of the Motel Manager.

She was an elderly thin woman with frizzy grey hair and incredible as it sounded, a dusty black eyepatch covering her right eye.

The pair of jumpy detectives turned to each other, doubting their own sanity at the procession of steadily spookier events.

"H. Hello? Ma'am? We were after a couple of rooms please.." Amy stuttered. The usually vocal Peralta seemed to have lost all ability to talk, or else the fist stuffed in his mouth was to stop him making some stupid remark that would get them both murdered.

The grizzled old woman grunted and slammed a clipboard onto the desk, making the detectives step back once more. Amy instinctively ducked behind Jake this time in fear at the sudden movement.

"Lucky. Last room." The owner grunted and slapped a single key on the counter for them with a disembodied little rabbit's foot on the key chain. She loudly spat into a small bucket on the floor that was half full of a mysterious black liquid.

Jake stammered something that might have been thanks and deposited the work credit card on the desk, he picked up the keys with a delicate pinch as if he might catch something from the severed limb attached to them.

The pair bolted from the office just as quickly as they could, all courage failing.

* * *

Outside once more the detectives spoke freely in whispered tones, as they hurried to find their room and hide from hypothermia.

"Soooo, very real chance we get murdered out here.." Jake opened things off, earning him another punch from an edgy looking Amy.

"Jaaaake stop it, I'm creeped out enough here as it is." She pleaded and he was suddenly conscious of how close she walked to him in the blistering cold and bustling wind. They walked shoulder to shoulder, with the smaller officer leaned in to the larger one, using him as a support and a break against the wind.

 _It was practical_ , Amy lied to herself and definitely not to draw some scant reassurance from his presence.

"No its cool Ames, we'll uncover some horrendous kill house and bust the crazy cyclopoid serial killer motel manager." He broke it to her like it was good news and the plot of an action movie.

"It all ends in a life and death chase from an archaic motel laundry room and I finish the fight by blindsiding the hag with the door on a dryer." His crazy daydream continued as only they could.

"And where am I while all this is happening?" Amy bought into his make believes with the start of a smile, he had effectively made something a bit weird into something amusing once more.

"Well as a strong independent Latina; you don't need no man and are instead discovering evidence of all her nefarious murders and the remains of several other stunningly attractive NYPD detectives."

"Stunningly attractive huh?" She played along, her eyebrow arched at that point. A compliment hidden in his narrative?

"But not as attractive or smart as us though, because they didn't figure it out in time." He finished grimly like he had just revealed the tag line for their own horror movie.

Amy buried her face lower in the top of her jacket to suppress a giggle at his over the top antics.

"I've always wanted to catch an actual serial killer." He mused.

"Is that weird?" Jake wondered in an odd moment of introspection.

Amy couldn't help but smile at how her unorthodox partner had managed to turn the bizarre circumstances into a thing of amusement, even if he fed off her fears a little bit with it. That was sort of how most of his jokes seemed to go; personalised to the individual.

"You are the embodiment of weird, Peralta." She told him, but in a friendly tone that had started sneaking into her voice more then she would like recently.

"Hey I'm not the one who irons my sheets or plays pretend in the captain's hat." He shot back, once more shocking her about how much information he had somehow managed to guile out of her over the years.

They stopped in front of door number 13, a dull brown door with peeling paint and snow piled at the door.

Amy looked apprehensively at Jake once more, he shot her a grin with far more confidence then he felt and shoved the key into the stiff lock. Just like they would when entering the house of an offender, they stacked up at the doorway and Jake led the way bashing the door open.

The pair stormed into the room and realised that they had both drawn their service weapons out of force of habit and the hair-raising vibe coming off the place.

With an embarrassed cough, they each holstered and Amy pushed the door closed once more, as Jake flickered the weak ceiling light into life. In the struggling light that bathed the room, neither appeared particularly impressed.

* * *

It was the most simple of rooms with an old, simple double bed in the center with a short bedside table on each side. Carpet gave way into a tiled floor towards the back of the room where it became a tiny kitchenette, with a closed door coming off it that must have led to the bathroom.

"It's…. Cosy?" Jake finally decided on, having struggled to find a positive way to describe the room.

"This isn't so bad, right?" Amy agreed, using the fake shrill voice she seemed to fall into when she blatantly lying or holding something back.

Their fake chilled attitudes disappeared in a start when they noticed the large coppery brown stain that was on the carpet in front of the bed. The pair had been detectives long enough and been in enough crime scenes to know the appearance of old blood staining.

"Woah!" They yelled together, dropping their bags and springing together back towards the door.

In the room next door someone thumped loudly against the wall and their muffled yell carried though.

"Keep it down over there, we are trying to screw!"

"Definitely, going to die here." Jake whispered in morbid mortification.

Beside him Amy was gasping like a fish not recently acquainted with water and one of her cold hands had drilled into the gap between her partners body and hers and clutched at his wrist.

Looking down at the usually cool and collected partner of his, Jake realised his mistake soon enough.

"I mean, there is no way I'm dying here and missing out on the chance to tell the squad about the time you forced me to stay in a sleazy motel room with you." Peralta amended his statement with the same eagerness of a child on Christmas.

"It literally is the Sleazy motel." Amy granted him with a small smile and grateful for the distraction, she gave his arm a quick squeeze to let him know that she was onto his plan. She knew what he was doing; distracting her through his own signature brand of humour and boy did she ever appreciate him for it.

"I'm sure that stain on the floor isn't blood anyway, it's probably bourbon or something." Jake lied, disregarding the terrifying find.

"Yeah." Amy agreed shakily, literally. She shivered violently from head to toe and had become aware of the melting snow that was now dripping down her back and into her boots.

Beside her, Jake's whole body wracked with a spasm of cold that probably wasn't helped by her freezing hold hands. She dropped his arm and spun her partner to face him.

"We need to get dry and warm quickly or we are both in serious risk of hypothermia." Amy informed him, through chattering teeth.

"I genuinely think we may freeze to death before we get a chance to be murdered anyway." Jake mused jokingly with a shaking nod of agreement and crossed his arms over his chest to try and conserve heat.

"Doesn't look like there is a damn heater." He despaired looking over the bare dwelling and dropping the hood on his fleece lined jacket. He kicked off his black and white sketchers, which were soaked through and sat on the bed to massage his numb toes.

Amy thought his jacket looked a lot warmer then hers and she wondered if he just undid it and she cuddled into him; just how toasty that would be?

Santiago mentally slapped herself; _surely thoughts like that were the first sign of hypothermia?_

"We need to warm up now!" She mumbled more to herself than anyone else.

* * *

Bustling past Jake on stiff legs, Amy shoved open the bathroom door to reveal a run down, but less horrifying then she had imagined bathroom. Switching on the shower and pushing it across to its hottest setting, she was disgusted by the initial burst of murky grey water that issued from the shower head. Amy periodically dipped her hand in testing the temperature and was devastated at the apparent lack of increase. Finally admitting defeat, Amy caught a fleeting flash of her flushed cheeks and pink nose in the cracked mirror and ducked out of the bathroom.

And almost died of shock.

Jake was standing by the bed a pile of his clothes messily discarded on the floor.

But most shockingly, he was standing in all his pale glory, just in a pair of his old faded black jeans that he was in the process of removing.

It wasn't the first time Amy had seen him in various stages of undress; in a close working relationship, they had been several times each where one they may had quickly changed in front of each other. Like now, it had been cold and business like, getting dressed for a cover or after getting bled on. It was always an exercise conducted with haste and the courtesy of facing the other way to preserve dignity. It had certainly never been a chance for her to check out the pale slim torso of her lean partner.

 _Had he ever checked her out in these times?_ Amy might never know, but after they sort of admitted having feelings for each other it had been something that they had suddenly become self-conscious about. If Amy was honest she had perhaps peeked over at her partner when he was getting changed once or twice, but not exclusively. She had also admired how toned Diaz was and how much of a better figure she had. Not that she would ever admit to that to her either.

In this instance, Amy must have made some sort of noise, because Jake turned round casually to see what she had found.

"The shower isn't… hot." Santiago awkwardly trailed off, wondering how her partner managed to stay as skinny looking as a buck rat with the terrible diet and exercise regime he kept. Jake could never be described as muscled, but there was a definite strength to his lean, wiry figure, which may have been more transposed from his personality than anything else.

"Aww man!" Jake groaned and pulled back on the white singlet that had been his bottom layer, he had left his jeans on in courtesy of the conversation she had started.

Some tiny irresponsible part of Amy that had been becoming bolder recently, echoed his sentiment as he redressed.

"Have you got any spare clothes with you?" Santiago slowly asked him, having opened her small travel bag in despair to see that its contents were soaked, having apparently collected snow through a half opened zip, during their short walk in the blizzard.

She dumped out a handful of damp clothes in annoyance a growl forming in her throat. Again it frustrated her; the super organised Amy Santiago, relying on the messy, never prepared Jake Peralta. Of course he had spare clothes, which would just make her feel even sillier.

Jake walked back over to the bed, with a victorious expression and lifted his stakeout bag from the foot of it. Moving a large bag of nuts, he pulled out a blue NYPD hoody, some old running shorts and a white training t-shirt. He offered all the items to her for dubious inspection. Taking a sniff of the white t-shirt, she realised it wasn't as white as first thought and had a large ketchup stain on it. Wrinkling her nose at the unwashed smell she passed it back to him, along with the wildly impractical shorts.

"Are you sure?" He goaded her shaking the tiny pair of shorts again as if he could tempt her.

They were shoved back into his hands firmer this time and the hoody snatched from him. The door to the bathroom slammed behind her huffily.

* * *

It came down to almost her knees and smelt unbearably strong of Jake Peralta, but the hoody was warm and most importantly dry. Which was more then she could say for the rest of her clothes, with the exception of her underwear, Amy had valiantly hung it all up around the small shower in the fleeting hope that it may somehow dry out.

Returning in pretty much just the sweatshirt, Jake choked on a wayward peanut when he saw her.

She in turn almost giggled back, Jake was down to his white singlet and had donned the far too short pair of running shorts from earlier.

He was making a focussed effort to keep his eyes at an appropriate level and it made Santiago subconsciously tug at the hem of the borrowed sweatshirt.

"Shut up, all my other clothes are wet." She tried to growl in reminder, but it came out as a shuddering shiver, she hadn't warmed up much.

"I said nothing, it is a good look." He quickly added and pulled uncomfortably at his tight athletic shorts.

Amy couldn't help but snigger at him, shaking her head.

"How long has it been since you wore those things?" She wondered and definitely wasn't using the comment to stare.

Jake stared down at his hairy, milky white legs lost in thought.

"Probably not since academy?" He admitted shamelessly.

"I know what you are thinking, Santiago. I still totally rock them." The wise arse added with his trademark wide mouth frog grin. He lifted a leg up on the bed and posed outrageously, a small corner of his mind remembering a certain file, on a certain detective's computer that had been found on movie night a month ago.

Santiago couldn't hide the full blown laugh that burst through this time at his ridiculous antics, before the shake of laughter transformed back into violent shivering.

"It is so fucking cold." She needlessly remarked to her quaking partner.

"The bed looks surprisingly clean, get in, and get warm." Jake suggested, returning to rifle through his bag.

Amy didn't need much encouragement and found the double bed as he said; it was old sure, but odour and stain free, which would have to do. She burrowed under the covers like a mole and sat up to wrap the two blankets around her and watch Jake.

From his bag the male detective withdrew the big back of mixed nuts and a half empty bottle of mysterious blue drink. Not a huge haul of provisions, she frowned.

Poking an arm out from under the covers, Amy pointed at her own bag.

"Check the main pocket, see what I've got in there." She suggested having completely forgotten what she may have in there.

Jake pulled out her spare glasses and crossed his eyes, trying them on and carrying on through the bag pretty much blind. He turfed a sodden packet of shame cigarettes onto the bench along with a little pink lighter. Shaking his head disapprovingly, Jake removed more pieces of damp paper, unimportant things like prisoner transfer forms and the like that had wisely been left in his partner's care. He wondered briefly if they could be used to light a fire.

"Oh Santiago you little beauty!" He cried in success, lifting a hand to hold aloft a small silver flask.

Amy suddenly realised what he had and swiped desperately to try and take it from him.

"Give that here Peralta!" She demanded erupting from the covers to try and wrestle it from him.

Her frustratingly tall partner held it out of her reach and was too quick at untwisting the top.

In horror Amy realised she was grappling with her partner in pretty much just a sweatshirt and hastily ceased and instead decided to use other powers at her disposal. Wielding a severe look of disapproval she crossed her arms and waited as he eagerly took a couple of good gulps form the hip flask.

"Don't drink it all!" She scolded him, finally snatching the flask from him as he lowered it from his lips.

"Damn, Santiago! You've been holding out on me, that is top shelf tequila!" Jake admired, wiping his mouth and watching, impressed as the girl in question took a generous slug from it herself.

"Any long assignment with you necessitates a drink after hours." She challenged.

"We are not really supposed to drink with the risk of hypothermia though." She remembered and hiccupped, stuffing the flask into her pocket away from his large greedy mouth.

"Call it a compromise, for the stress of the event." Jake rationalized in that simple way he managed to make light of any situation.

"At least we'll die drunk." Amy agreed, another shiver hitting her and prompting her to dart back under the covers once more.

* * *

"I actually had a thought on that." Jake started and his tone caught Amy's attention.

Taking his bottle of blue stuff he swigged back the dregs with a grimace.

"Doesn't go well with tequila," He elaborated with blue lips.

Taking the empty bottle he tiptoed across the cold kitchen floor to where the kettle steamed away.

Amy figured he must have put it on while she was out of the room.

Carefully he filled the bottle up with boiling water and firmly screwed the lid back on. Tossing the hot bottle between his hands, he finally wrapped it up in a tea towel and returned to Amy.

He held out the improvised hot water bottle to Santiago and she eagerly accepted it.

Her face glowed as the warmth sunk into her core, clutched against the coldest parts of herself.

"Jake that is brilliant!" She moaned huddling into the new source of heat.

"I amaze myself sometimes." Her cocky partner admitted, shaking violently.

Amy realised in that moment, looking at the strained grin on his face, just how selfish she had been.

"Jake you are freezing!" She commented, reaching out to capture his hands.

"Nah, cold hands, warm heart; don't they say?" He joked, but failed to hide the shiver that passed across him or the goosebumps on his bare skin.

"Come here." Amy ordered in her most authoritative voice and it crumbled all of Jake's resistance.

She lifted the blanket edge, offering an opening for him to slip under too.

Slowly the lanky detective, slipped under the duvet with her and brought it swiftly back down to cover them both.

Sitting together was awkward and lifted the blanket at the edges if they weren't close enough, so in wordless agreement they lay back on the pillows.

They both lay staring up at the ceiling in an uncomfortable silence, until Jake of course broke it.

"Is there any tequila left?" He asked her and turned to see her already taking a giant swig.

He gratefully accepted the flask from her as she tried to swallow the burning mouthful without sitting up.

"That's better!" Jake lied through chattering teeth and passed her back the now empty vessel.

"Jesus, your hand are like ice!" She commented in shock at his cold touch, when their fingers brushed.

"Just call me Elsa. Let it go, Santiago!" Peralta replied with a crooked grin and starting to sing.

"Do not fucking start that song!" She warned placing a nippy hand over his over large mouth to suppress him.

Jake was left to smile with his eyes at her instead.

"My nieces have the Frozen DVDs, the toys, everything. I can't seem to escape that damn song." She grumbled in explanation and tentatively removed her hand to see if he would start singing again.

Amy noticed as soon as her hand had been removed it was replaced with a shivering smile once more. Her chest leapt as she thought about how cold he must be and all the kind things he had already done to make sure she felt warm and reassured.

"Here." She insisted, passing him the bottle of hot water that she had been cradling to her core for warmth.

"Na I'm good." Jake denied, refusing to receive it and merely holding it with her.

"Liar." She snorted and their teeth chattered together in agreement.

"You are cold even on the sunny days at home, you need it more." He maintained with an edge of that teasing he usually had when he revealed something he knew about her.

"Yeah, but you are all skin and bone, Peralta. You have no fat to protect you." She counter argued.

"Neither do you." He shot back quick as a whip.

One of his frigid hands shot past her defences to poke her teasingly in the stomach. She shrieked in amused surprise at the touch and terrible temperature that assaulted her bare stomach; her sweatshirt was still raised up at the front where she had withdrawn the hot water bottle from.

"See? Not an ounce of fat on you. No wonder you are always cold." Peralta mocked her, laughing at her reaction.

"Such a jerk, Peralta!" She accused with more laughter then venom in her voice and she jabbed him back in his prominent ribs.

He jumped and squirmed just as she had and elicited a giggle from her attacker.

A short rib poking and jabbing war broke out for several seconds, of which Amy wore the brunt of.

* * *

"Curse those gangly long limbs of yours." She growled, still trying not to grin at the overall silliness of the situation.

All the activity, while warming had lifted the edge of the duvet though and released all the nice hot air they had worked so hard to create. Subconsciously, Amy shifted away from the cold air seeping in on the edge and nipping at her ankles. In doing so, she bumped her head against his. Apparently he had the same idea and was wriggling away from the cold.

In the middle of the bed they locked eyes and came to the inevitable conclusion, the one they had both been avoiding since they saw the single bed.

"We should cuddle for warmth." They both finally admitted together.

There was a brief pause as they both let that statement sink in.

Jake coughed awkwardly.

"For survival." He added, precariously reaching a long arm across her shoulder.

"For survival." Amy hastily agreed, carefully sliding into his arms and slowly turning onto her side to be the small spoon.

"We will take no enjoyment from this at all." Jake vowed unconvincingly as he placed the hot water bottle against his stomach and pulled her in tight against his chest.

"None what so ever." Amy also promised, suppressing a sigh at the warmth that had enveloped her. Even his cold arms held heat buried in them somewhere that seemed to ignite wrapped around her waist. She brought her own arms to superimpose over top his to cradle that warmth.

"Amy Santiago, you have the boniest butt of any woman I've ever met." Jake whispered in her ear softly, causing an influx of butterflies in Amy and for a mildly offended grin to creep up her face.

"Aww did you want to be little spoon?" She simpered back, coyly looking over her shoulder at him.

"Who doesn't like being little spoon?" He turned it back on her, completely unashamed of his preference.

"Sooo needy." Amy rolled her eyes affectionately, but complied and rolled back over to face him.

For a second it looked as though he wasn't going to turn as well, in that moment, she was also sort of okay with that idea. Face to face had its perks too.

Seemingly reluctant, he rolled to face away from her, the last view she had was that disappearing wide mouth frog grin.

Wrapping him up in her arms and intertwining their legs, Amy sighed into the back of his head. It was the closest the pair had ever actually been and she felt overwhelmed by him. His scent, of leather and something sweet, most likely a type of candy or sugary treat. His warmth; having quickly returned and ablaze just under his skin. That skin so smooth and pale, hiding a surprising amount of lean muscle underneath it. A steady, rapid thumping ran in her chest and she worked out that it wasn't just her own, it was his too, transferred through his chest. The soft bellows of his breathing was reassuring and made her feel content and sleepy. Amy closed her eyes in satisfaction at the unlikely turn the day had taken.

* * *

So of course he had to ruin the moment by talking.

It seemed like they had only been lying there for moments when he piped up again.

"Shift over Amy, my leg has gone to sleep." He hissed.

With great reluctance, Amy released him and shuffled over onto her back. Beside her he did the same.

He pumped his leg a few times to get the circulation going.

"You are warm." She informed him, before taking one of his arms and dragging it over with her when she rolled away from him.

He obliged and moved over to hold her again, his chin resting on top of her head.

All thoughts of the precinct and the Captain or their work went out the door as they lay there.

Until Amy became aware of it.

"Is that your gun digging into my back?" She asked hopefully.

Jake sputtered.

"Of course. You think I wouldn't be strapping with that crazy one-eyed lady out there? Someone has to keep their head, Santiago!"

Amy hmmed and nodded approvingly.

"Thank you, Jake." She murmured sleepily and raised one of his hands to kiss the back of it.

The warmth increased in her as she felt his head move and he planted a soft kiss on the top of her head, maybe it wasn't where she wanted that kiss, but it was a start.

"I got your back, Amy." He assured her and in this instance it was literally.

"Hey Jake isn't that your service weapon on the bench?" She suddenly noticed through half closed eyelids.

The arms around her grew tight in tension.

"Is it?" He managed to squeak.

Amy giggled softly to herself and pushed herself closer, if that was possible, into him. She withheld another laugh at the way he jerked in surprise before his arms lost their tension once more.

"I can literally reach that gun in a second if anyone bursts through the door with a machete." Jake promised in compensation.

"Such a bad liar." She chided him softly.

"But you are warm." Amy added in consideration. This was something they had fought for so long.

The usually talkative and boisterous Jake Peralta was silent for once.

"Maybe you could keep me warm when we finally get back home too?" She finished hopefully.

A huge intake of breath against her back and it slowly blew out somewhere over her head.

"Yeah?" He confirmed in husky whisper that gave her goosebumps all over again, despite the increasing warmth of the situation.

"Yeah." Amy decided for them, rolling over to face him and capture his flushed face in her cold hands.

He tasted like tequila and surprise, a delicious combo.

"Sooo glad we didn't get murdered tonight. Yet.." Jake gasped out when they broke apart from the heated kiss. Amy was already burrowing into his chest, seeking out the warmth there.

"Ah well, at least we will die warm." She reminded him.


End file.
